He had chosen.

As each day passed, the void in his heart grew despairingly larger. He was sure she would return, so painfully sure but the lack of her presence was a daunting shadow looming over his mind.

He remembered Mikhail's last words to him and bristled angrily. Had that bastard done anything to her? Did she not come simply because she couldn't, as something had happened to her?

Malik took a deep breath and rested his head on his pillow. There was no point wondering about the 'whats ifs'. She had not shown and it had been a week. If she wasn't going to come to him, he will go to her.

For the first time in his life, Malik was going to make a selfish decision. He loved his mother with every fibre of his being but that could not compare to the immense, overwhelming raw love he felt for his mate.

If something were to happen to his mate, he would die of sorrow and anguish but if it were to happen to his mother, he would grieve and surely move on. There was never a second mate, she had half of his soul and he had half of hers. If she were to go, he would remain half full for the rest of his miserable existence, half-crazed, half-sane. He would be weak and vulnerable to anyone, especially to his brother.

In the distance, there was the familiar rattling of the medical trolley wheeled along the concrete floor approaching his room. It was the nurse who, like clockwork, would show up at his room at five in the afternoon for his dose of aconitum. He hated how submissive he had to act, how he had to roll up his sleeve and grit his teeth as she would inject him, day in, day out with a poison that was slowly leeching at his strength, mind, senses and wolf.

It took a while for the aconitum to merge with his body and he remembered that searing pain in his soul he felt when suddenly half a year after the first dosage, he felt the emotional connection with his wolf sever. Now in its place was a void, a cruel empty mass that teased his sanity. Every now and then, he would feel a whisper of what he used to be but before he could hold on to it, it would disappear, leaving him ever so lonely.

Losing the ability to shift was one of the cruellest fates to land on a wolf. Without the wolf, one was simply... human. Scents become bland and dull. Audios become muted and deaf. Your eyes lose visual acuity and sensitivity. Slowly, Malik could feel all of those gradually creeping upon him. When he first came, he could scent animals miles away, hear insects creeping along the rafters of the sixth floor and see the pores in the concrete several metres away. Now all of those were dulling. Fading. The concrete looked smooth. The insects were quiet. The scents had disappeared.

Seeing Arya had been a necessary shock to his system. All of a sudden, he could smell once again. See once again. Hear once again. It made him feel alive, woke him from the comatose state that he had been in for so long.

If he was to break free, he couldn't allow himself to be injected again. He needed to be strong to find her. In fact, if he didn't have Alpha blood running through his veins, he would never have stood a chance. He could only hang on to his former self by thin threads because of his Alpha blood.

The handle slowly twisted open and the nurse walked in backwards, wheeling the trolley in.

Strangely, that angered him. He was seen as so little of a threat that she could face her back towards him. He had weakened so much that the nurse who at first was too terrified to breathe the same air as him, could comfortably inject him with the damned poison. She was the predator and he had become the damn prey.

She turned to face him with a disinterested look on her face. She wore the signature blue uniform a nurse would wear, a thin gold chain with her blonde hair tied up neatly in a tight bun. As she pulled out the familiar bottle and syringe with ease, the familiarity symbolising how often she would practise this routine, Malik felt the first tingle of adrenaline.

Malik watched as the purple sluggish liquid was drawn into the steel syringe, the nurse pulling the plunger right to the top. The syringe had to hold at least five hundred millilitres, dwarfing the nurse's small hand. Then she capped the bottle and approached him with the syringe.

Every step she took, his heart beat one faster. It was now or never. His mother or his mate. As the tip of the needle touched his skin at the crook of his arm, he snapped into action. The nurse yelped in surprise as he shoved her back, sending her tumbling across the room and the medical trolley sprawling across the floor. The glass bottle of aconitum shattered on impact, sending the purple liquid pooling along the floor, staining the nurse's clothes with splotches of purple.

The nurse gasped and tried to scramble back, her nails scratching along the hard ground with fear.

"Please, don't hurt me", she sobbed, frozen in shock.

Malik stared at her. It was such a contrast to her earlier behaviour and strangely, it filled him with a sense of power. He hadn't lost everything. He was still strong.

"Get on the bed", he ordered, in a calm voice.

A strange hiccup came from the nurse as she got up on shaky legs and staggered to the bed. "Please, I'll do anything-"

"Anything?" Malik asked with a cocked brow.

"Anything", the nurse confirmed desperately, crossing her arms over her chest. "Please, don't- don't... Please don't touch me".

Malik stared at her incredulously and laughed a cruel laugh. "Why the hell would I touch you?"

The nurse spluttered in surprise and he laughed again. Malik picked the metal syringe from the floor and walked towards her in measured steps, watching how she trembled with fear.

For the first time in a while, he felt like he was again who he once was. He felt strong, feared.

"Roll your sleeve up", he ordered.

The nurse gasped and shuffled along the bed anxiously. "No, please don't".

"Why not?" He interrupted. "You've done the same to me for all these years. As I cried and begged you not to, you didn't care. You saw me suffer and weep and my body went through so much pain, and you didn't care. So tell me, nurse, why should I fucking care what you want?"

"Because", she gasped, still shuffling along the bed. Malik watched her with narrowed eyes and then realised how she was trying to move to the trolley. In one swift motion, he kicked the trolley away, barely flinching as the metal smashed in the concrete wall forcefully, more glass smashing on impact.

"Now, you crossed a line", Malik said with a touch of maliciousness. "I wouldn't have done anything", he lied. He walked to the nurse and pulled out her arm with force and poised the needle above her skin. He looked up at her trembling face and moist eyes and smiled. Then he plunged the large needle in, the metal tearing through her skin. She shrieked in pain but he pushed all the liquid in her body anyway, watching in satisfaction as her surrounding veins turned purple as the aconitum was absorbed in her bloodstream.

The nurse sobbed hysterically and clutched her arm in fear, shaking like a leaf.

"Does it hurt?" Malik whispered, leaning down to her ear. He laughed, sending his breath crawling along her ear, making her shiver. "Tell me, does it hurt?"

She nodded frantically, more tears streaming down her face, her left hand gripping onto her right arm so tightly, nail marks were left embedded in her skin.

"Should I take the pain away?" He whispered again.

"Yes, please", she gasped in agony.

"Ask nicely", he teased.

"Please, take- take the pain away".

"That was not good enough", Malik chuckled. "Beg for it".

"Please, please, please, I beg of you, I'm begging, please", she sobbed, her breath hitching. "Please take this pain away or just kill me, please".

"Well", Malik smiled, blowing air on her clammy, pale face. "If you insist".

The nurse watched with wide, bloodshot eyes as his hand approached her neck. The nurse was small, small enough that his hand wholly wrapped around her neck.

He began to squeeze, the nurse still wailing away as he tighten the pressure. He watched her as her face began to turn red and she began to claw at his hands. Small scratches appeared on his hands but he watched the blood well up with disinterest. The nurse gasped once again and then her eyes fluttered shut.

Malik then let go and watched as she slumped back on the bed, carelessly. She was still alive but it would take a while for her to wake up.

He wouldn't have gone this far but a thick red rage filled his vision as he realised what she was. One of what he was. He was her Alpha and she betrayed him so easily. He didn't remember her from the pack but he didn't care, she had wolf blood running in her veins. The aconitum confirmed it, if she was human it would have only put her to sleep, not hurt her. Already the bruises on her neck were fading away and the scratches healing. He glanced at her name tag.

"Farewell, Nurse Carter", he chuckled as he turned to leave the room.

Hello there,

I have written, A LOT. I decided rather than writing, publishing and then inevitably crashing, I was going to write as much as I can and then update.

So you can expect a chapter every two days hopefully (I just need to edit them, there are a lot of spelling and grammar mistakes T-T). And I plan for this story to be finished by the end of this month.

How do you feel about this chapter? You're seeing a side of Malik that you or at least Arya has never seen. I'm just going to put it out there but Malik and Mikhail are twins lmao 😈.

Question for Today:

Peaches or Apricots? (This is a very random question and I am running out of questions).

Last first was bananabel17 who is new! Hi there :)

Today's first, comment here -->

P.S. If there are any mistakes, please let me know, I sometimes miss the most obvious things when proofreading.